YEAR IN REVIEW 2017–2018 1 Message from the President, AGO Board of Trustees, and the Michael and Sonja Koerner Director, and CEO 2017/18 was a phenomenal year for the Art Gallery of Ontario as we welcomed over one million visitors – the highest annual attendance since the AGO re-opened in 2008! We achieved this by focusing on art and programming from diverse artists, which brought in new audiences. Throughout the year, approximately 29 per cent of our visitors were in their twenties. We would not have been able to accomplish this amazing result without the contributions and dedication of all our staff, volunteers and Board of Trustees. Together, we continued to fulfill our mission to bring people together with great art to see, experience and understand the world in new ways. The AGO brought to Toronto extraordinary exhibitions that profiled great artists and masterpieces from around the world such as Georgia O’Keeffe; Guillermo del Toro: At Home with Monsters; Yayoi Kusama: Infinity Mirrors; Sandra Meigs: Room for Mystics (with Christopher Butterfield); Mitchell/Riopelle: Nothing in Moderation , and many more. We acquired 246 works during the year, bringing each area of the AGO Collection to a higher level of excellence. A major highlight was the acquisition of prints and drawings by renowned artists Shuvinai Ashoona, Kerry James Marshall, Kara Walker, Kees van Dongen, and Albrecht Dürer. Our public programming continued to focus on meaningful and engaged experiences with art, encouraging conversations with our audiences about issues they care about. AGO Creative Minds returned to a full house at Toronto’s iconic Massey Hall in the fall of 2017. It featured global, visionary artists and passionate discourse on the theme of Art and Nationhood. Our education programs welcomed over 40,000 students and we hosted more than 105 engaging public events. With the support from Ontario 150, we also launched a virtual field trips pilot program that brings our Collection to remote and underserved northern school communities using two-way video technology. Family-friendly activities continued to make the AGO a great destination for inter-generational visits throughout 2017, including a Halloween Bash, Family Sundays, Family Day and weekly youth drop-in activities. Our sincere thanks go to our public and private supporters. The Ontario Ministry of Tourism, Culture and Sport is our primary government partner, with additional assistance from the City of Toronto, Canada Council for the Arts, and the Department of Canadian Heritage. In the private sector, we are very grateful for the generosity of individuals, corporations and foundations that enable us to provide a full and diverse range of programs to the public. Their ongoing commitment is the key to our success! Robert J. Harding President, AGO Board of Trustees Stephan Jost Michael and Sonja Koerner Director, and CEO 2 Highlights of the Year • Canadian multimedia artist Alex Mayhew presented April 1, 2017 – March 31, 2018 ReBlink (July 2017 – April 2018), an innovative augmented reality installation that allowed visitors Exciting exhibitions, programs and activities filled the to see works from the AGO’s Canadian Collection in 2017/18 calendar at the AGO. a whole new way. Using a custom digital interface designed for smartphones, ReBlink highlighted how We marked Canada’s 150th birthday with an much we have and haven’t changed in 150 years by ambitious exhibition that critically explored three inviting visitors to look at historic paintings through urgent questions through the eyes of some of the a 21st century lens. country’s best emerging and established artists: Where had Canada came from? What was it in 2017? Other exciting 2017/18 programs included: And where was it going? Opening on June 29 and running until December 10, Every. Now. Then: • Georgia O’Keeffe (April 22–July 30, 2017). This Reframing Nationhood aimed to address the mistakes major retrospective featured over 80 works of of the past, rewrite and reclaim history, and move art by one the 20th century’s most successful into the future with new insight. Organized by the and influential modernists. The exhibition also AGO, this multimedia installation featured close to examined O’Keeffe’s relationships with renowned 50 new and recent projects by artists from across photographers of the time including Ansel Canada, including Gu Xiong and Yu Gu, Robert Houle, Adams, Paul Strand and Alfred Stieglitz. Organized Meryl McMaster, Seth, Esmaa Mohamoud, Ed Pien by Tate Modern in collaboration with the AGO and and Shuvinai Ashoona, among many others. the Bank Austria Kunstforum, Vienna, the exhibition made its only North American stop in Toronto. Our Canada 150 program included the following installations: • Mark Lewis: Canada (April 15–December 10, 2017) presented an anthology of connected films that explored the name “Canada” and how it had come to be associated, both within our country and throughout the world, with fantasies, stories and imaginary histories. Mark Lewis, born in Canada and based in London, is among the most prominent artists of his generation working in photography and moving images. • The Toronto: Tributes + Tributaries, 1971–1989 exhibition (September 29, 2016 – May 22, 2017) was an infusion of newly installed art for a fresh glimpse into the ‘70s and ‘80s. Among the newcomers were large-scale installation pieces by Vera Frenkel and FASTWÜRMS, alongside multimedia works by Jayce Salloum, and Lisa Steele and Kim Tomczak. These works brought us into the present by highlighting the fact that the majority of the artists in the exhibition are still making work today. Georgia O’Keeffe, Jimson Weed/White Flower No. 1, 1932. Oil on canvas, 121.9 x 101.6 cm. Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, Bentonville, COVER IMAGE: Paintings by Lawren S. Harris, on display in the Thomson Arkansas. Photography by Edward C. Robison III © Georgia O’Keeffe Collection of Canadian Art at the Art Gallery of Ontario. Museum/SODRAC 2018. 3 Meryl McMaster, Time’s Gravity, 2015. Inkjet print mounted to dibond, 76.2 x 114.3 cm. Courtesy of the artist and Katzman Contemporary. © Meryl McMaster. • Free Black North (April 29–August 20, 2017) This major solo retrospective, drawn largely from revealed photographic portraits of descendants the AGO Collection, positioned Letendre alongside of black refugee communities who escaped such contemporaries as Guido Molinari, Frank enslavement in the southern United States and Stella and Paul-Émile Borduas. The exhibition gave settled in Canada in the early to mid-19th century. Torontonians the opportunity to explore her work Drawn from the Alvin McCurdy Collection at the in more detail – an artist they were already familiar Ontario Archives and the Rick Bell Family Collection with from her work in many public spaces such as at the Brock University Library, as well as private the Royal Bank Plaza, Glencairn subway station, and family holdings, the photographs in this exhibition Ryerson University. illustrated ways in which these families carved out a place for themselves in the Canadian communities • Sandra Meigs: Room for Mystics (with Christopher they called home. Butterfield) (October 19, 2017 – January 14, 2018) was an immersive environment created especially for • As If Sand Were Stone: Contemporary Latin this exhibition by Sandra Meigs, in collaboration with American from the AGO Collection (May 20–August distinguished contemporary composer Christopher 7, 2017). For the first time, the AGO presented its Butterfield. Comprised of paintings, a wall treatment, extensive collection of Latin American contemporary a sculptural mobile and a sound installation, the art in its own exhibition. The artists, originating from exhibition created a unique experience for the visitor. Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, Chile, Cuba, Mexico and Venezuela, were each influenced by the specific • Florine Stettheimer: Painting Poetry (October 21, geographic, political and social contexts and artistic 2017 – January 28, 2018) organized by the AGO legacies of their respective countries. These artists’ and the Jewish Museum, New York, this exhibit works provoked visitors to reflect upon issues of introduced Stettheimer’s extraordinary work to time, place and identity and to question issues of Canadian audiences for the first time. Showcasing belonging, precarity and transience. over 50 paintings and drawings in addition to ballet and opera costume and set designs, the exhibition • Rita Letendre: Fire & Light (June 29–September 14, examined this key figure in the modern art scene of 2017) explored the artist’s role in modern abstraction. New York in the early 20th century. 4 ancient artifacts, books, maquettes and film—reflected the broad and alluring scope of del Toro’s inspirations. A major undertaking for the AGO in 2017 was a reinstallation of the AGO Collection. This initiative, known as Look:Forward, showcased exceptional art that presents the very best of our Collection. It inspires meaningful and engaging experiences for our visitors, ensures the AGO Collection’s relevance for our changing audiences and reflects the vibrancy of our city. Once fully completed, we will have 20 per cent more artworks on display, including in public spaces previously without art. Florine Stettheimer, Beauty Contest: To the Memory of P.T. Barnum, 1924. Oil on canvas, 127 x 153.7 cm. Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art, Hartford, CT. Gift of Ellie Stettheimer. • Organized by the AGO in partnership with the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA) and the Minneapolis Institute of Art (Mia), Guillermo del Toro: At Home with Monsters opened on September 30, 2017 and ran until January 7, 2018. The AGO was the only Canadian venue for this exhibition that offered a rare glimpse into the creative process of famed Toronto-based filmmaker Guillermo del Toro. The exhibition brought together elements from his films, objects from his vast personal collections as well as from the permanent collections of all three institutions. The diverse range of media featured in this exhibition—approximately 500 objects, including Tom Thomson, The West Wind, Winter 1916-1917.